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Ethical Dilemmas Are No Fun.
A dilemma, which is Greek for “two premises,” is compared in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance to the front end of an angry bull. Choose one path and be impaled on one horn, choose the other and receive the same fate. And I currently face a raging bull. A little background is in order before I explain my matadorial situation.
For the first time ever, there is now student pay-parking at Westwood High School. To address the state cut in local aid and because the School Committee decided that a Proposition 2 ½ override to raise the property taxes in town to finance the schools was too risky, the town seems to be concentrating the economic burden once carried by the state into student parking fees. Though most would characterize me as a “tax and spend Democrat,” I do believe in fair taxation. The plan proposed by the Superintendent and rubber-stamped by the School Committee is far from fair. The most glaring flaw in the plan is that the fee is going to the general fund and not directly to maintaining the parking lot; this is not a “user-fee” but a way to raise taxes on a few people, minors who cannot vote for (more likely against) those who are unfairly taxing them. The process of the School Committee was fundamentally unsound, it did not seek the opinions of students or community members before announcing the fees, and its principles were affronts to the rally cry of the American Revolution “no taxation without representation.” This injustice and the dangerous precedent it sets is why I became so angry over a fee that could easily seem like a minor issue.
So my friends and I mobilized. Last spring we encouraged protest in the form of a thoughtful campaign of letters to local newspapers and organized a demonstration in town square. Though we encouraged students to make their voices heard and attracted quite a bit of attention, we were ultimately unsuccessful; the fees stand with absolutely no reforms to the system. It will be very hard to reorganize as school begins again. So my friends came up with a plan to take matters into our own hands.
The spaces in the parking lot now have numbers painted on them so that violators can be easily identified. Frustrated that our efforts have been unsuccessful, three of my friends plan to spray paint over the numbers on the lot. They asked me to be their driver. They have what seemed to be a foolproof plan. My ethical dilemma is: “Should I join them?”
With this extensive background in mind, I write these words and must decide what course to take. I will choose my path based on whether or not it is the right thing to do, not the possible consequences I face. This is the way I make moral decisions. Either it is right to highlight injustice, jump start active opposition, and generate support that could defeat the fee, or it is wrong to cost the town more money to repaint the numbers during a budget crisis. If we do act, I fear that it will only mean that the money spent to repaint the parking lot will translate into reduced town services or an increased need for continued unjust fees. These are two positions that are diametrically opposed and both seem equally unlikely as justified.
At 10:00 pm the night before the planned spraying, I laid out the arguments both pro and con and decided that it would be wrong to help my friends. But because I trust them to make their own decisions, I clearly explained my own reasons for not taking part in their plan even though I knew that nothing short of informing on them would change their minds. I felt it would be disloyal to stop them. I explained to them that though I did not consider the vandalism part of the ethical equation, others, specifically parents and voters, would. This meant that acting in a destructive way would alienate the people we hoped to bring to our cause, ensuring our defeat. I hoped and still hope that we can impress the unfairness of the fees upon the School Committee, the parents, and the voters, but I realize that if my continued goal is truly to end the fees, and not just to seek revenge, then my path is clear; a jump up and over the bull.
Ahhhh, I love ethical philosophy...but hate writing college essays, no more for 4 years tho
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